Two Knives
by sinemoras09
Summary: Every man casts a shadow [Levi's criminal past; young Levi; warnings for violence; no spoilers]


_Author's note: This is basically my head canon about Levi's past. I'm actually working on a fan comic about this: I wasn't planning on writing this out as a fic, but it's easier for me to storyboard stuff when I have the chronology of events fully laid out. So this came from that. Hopefully it's not too out there :)_

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1.

Rain falls in harsh torrents against the nighttime city. A man runs. Footsteps slam against wet pavement and the man veers, a hard turn right, but his attacker lurches forward and changes direction. The man scrambles, running faster and faster. He's pure adrenaline now, heartbeat roaring and breathing hard. The street dips and he's rocketing downhill, feet pounding on pavement and splashes of puddles mushrooming around him.

There is a dead end. The man skids to a stop and whirls around, but his attacker walks forward. The edge of the switchblade catches the rain.

"Your money," Levi says.

The man falls to his knees.

The satchel of coins lands by Levi's feet.

xXx

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The year the Great Plague hit, there were not enough men to bury the dead. In the town square, the dead were wrapped with thick canvas cloth and tied with rope around their legs and necks, piled up at the village center like so many logs of wood. The stench was unbearable, and when nightfall came, the townsmen threw gasoline and torches on the mountain of bodies, a makeshift funeral pyre, orange flames rising high and licking the cold night air.

His parents, like many others, were burned with the rest of them, his sister crying and clutching his hand.

"Brother?"

Levi opens the door. Since their parents' death, they have moved from village to village, at first begging then stealing enough to live. His sister beams: she runs, grabbing Levi by the hands.

"Brother, what did you get this time?"

"I've brought apples," Levi says, and his sister squeals, grabbing the bag of fruit and emptying it on the table.

He doesn't tell his sister how he gets the money - she thinks he works odd jobs at the center of the city, but in truth no one will hire a teenage illiterate when they too have mouths to feed. Levi watches, oddly satisfied, as his sister knits her brow and peels the apple with utmost concentration, handling the knife clumsily in the fist of her hand.

"Here," Levi says. "You're holding it wrong," and he takes the knife from her, showing her.

"I'm doing it fine," his sister says, and she takes the knife from him. Levi frowns.

"The nutrients are in the skin, dummy, you should eat that too."

"The skin's not clean," his sister says, and Levi realizes they have no water to wash the apples. "Here, brother - I peeled one for you."

"Eat it yourself," Levi says.

xXx

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Levi is good with knives.

He's tried pickpocketing before; he's shoplifted from open carts and stolen from unattended store windows, but to steal meant spending time casing the place, hours or even days passing before the requisite payday. Outright stealing from travelers, however, was quicker, and Levi soon realized he could steal three times the amount he would normally make, and he was ruthless enough and skilled enough to make the benefits outweigh the risk.

He's never actually killed anyone, though - just showed off enough to be threatening - and for the past year it's enough to get by.

"What did you bring home this time, Brother?" his sister says.

"Meat," Levi says, and he unwraps the bundle of wax paper to show her.

One day, the man he robs isn't who he expects.

"Kid," the man says, and Levi sees it, the slow hand reaching in his pocket for a knife. "You've picked the wrong guy to mess with."

And Levi's fighting for his life, the satchel of coins spilling on the ground.

xXx

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The man is pinned under him, Levi's knee jammed against the man's chest and Levi's knife pressed against the man's throat.

"The money," Levi says. He's breathing hard. Sweat drips down his temple.

The man tries to move but Levi shoves the heel of his hand against the man's windpipe, making him wheeze. "I said, the money," Levi says. The man looks at him levelly.

And then he starts to laugh. Deep and full, laughter rolling out like fog. Levi stares at him, confused.

"Kid, you can take it," the man says. "You've earned it, as far as I'm concerned."

Levi moves off him and the man tosses him a satchel, gold coins spilling at Levi's feet. "Well what are you waiting for?" the man says. "Expecting me to run off, all grateful I'm alive and shit? Pick it up," the man says, and Levi glares at him, bending forward slowly to pick up the satchel of coins.

"No one's beaten me in a knife fight. Not for a long time," the man says. "Say, kid. How'd you like to make five times that? What do you say?"

"Fuck off," Levi says. He pockets the satchel and straightens.

"Kid," the man says again, and Levi turns. "You got talent, kid. It's a real shame to waste it. Here," the man says, and he reaches in his pocket. He pulls out a business card and hands it to him. "Tomorrow at midnight, come to this address. We'll have another job waiting for you."

Levi takes the business card, then hands it back to him.

"Sorry," Levi says. "Can't read," and the man laughs again, clapping him on the shoulder.

xXx

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2.

At first it is just bodyguard work - protection detail for lower-ranked crime lords, lieutenants and captains of the underground mob.

He rises quickly through the ranks. The money comes in bigger and bigger piles.

"Brother, what did you bring today?" his sister says, and Levi surprises her with a new doll, eyes smiling as his sister squeals and hugs him. She doesn't know and he deliberately doesn't tell her, letting her think his employers in the city have given him a huge pay raise, except the caveat is working longer hours and sometimes being out a few days before coming home.

But then the job gets noticeably harder.

"Kill?" Levi says. The men stand around the table, blueprints spread in front of him. "I'm not going to kill anyone."

"We don't need you for bodyguard work, kid." The men look down on him. Levi frowns.

They are rival crime lords from different gangs, and Levi is the only one skilled enough to take them. It will be quick, it will be painless, but there is threat of all of them getting killed if Levi doesn't take action. "It has to be you," his boss says. Levi shakes his head.

"Not interested," Levi says. He starts to leave, but the men step in front of the door.

"Kid, I don't think you understand," his boss says. "None of us are safe. That's including you and that's including your precious little sister. Don't think we don't know," the man says, and Levi stops and turns.

"They're gunning for our territory, kid. You're the only one quick enough to catch them first."

xXx

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He kills four people for the first time that night.

First is the sentry standing guard. One quick slice to the throat.

Second and third are two mafia lieutenants, drinking at the bar.

The fourth one sees him, reaching for a pistol when Levi throws his knife, slamming into the man's wrist and nailing his hand against the wall.

xXx

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Mafia scum. Just mafia scum. It doesn't matter if they get killed, they're all just mafia scum.

"Kid," his boss says. "We have another job," and this time he puts a gun in Levi's hand.

xXx

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There are seven, no, eight of them, men with guns and knives. Dead men slump on the floor and on the countertops, and when Levi steps backwards, his foot steps into a puddle of blood.

Levi's out of bullets. He only has the knife in his hand.

They lunge. Levi dodges, ducks, parries. One hard slash, the man staggering back. The man behind him charges forward.

He's shorter and smaller than them and it's easy to evade; a bar stool crashes. His knife flashes. A slash to the gut. Another slice to the throat.

"Brother!" His sister runs toward him as Levi staggers inside, one closed fist pressed against the wound. "Brother, what happened?"

"Nothing," Levi says, but he's dirty and sweaty and covered with a film of grime and filth.

xXx

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"Brother," his sister says, after he sits her down and tells her everything. "Brother you can't do this anymore."

"It's the only way I can make money," Levi says. His sister grips his hands.

"We don't need it," his sister says. Tears drip down the sides of her face.

"Brother I don't want to lose you too."

xXx

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3.

They move from place to place, because there is no safe place to stay.

No one will hire an illiterate teen, even though Levi can fake it well enough, and they go days without eating, and without money, Levi can't afford to pay the innkeepers their rent. The best Levi can come up with is working with the horses behind the stables, not for money but for a place to sleep. "You can sleep with the horses out back," the stable man says. "Shovel the shit and change the hay, and you can stay. Got it?"

His sister looks at him and grips his hand.

xXx

.

"Brother," his sister says. She's lying in bed, her face weak and pale. "Brother, what is that?"

"An apple," Levi says. "Here," and he slices her a piece.

He presses a hand against her forehead - cool skin and sweaty bangs - and silently counts the shallow breaths as she sleeps.

Fifty gold coins is cost of the medicine the healers offered to sell.

xXx

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"I thought you said you were out," his old boss says. Levi stands silently as the other men slowly circle him, large shadows looming in the darkness of the room. "Why the change, kid? I thought you said you didn't like killing people."

"I need the money," Levi says, and his old boss grins.

xXx

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"Where are you going?" his sister says. He doesn't look at her when he speaks.

"I got another job," Levi says, and his sister's face crumbles.

"Brother," she says. "I don't want you to go."

Slowly, he sits on the bed beside her, the mattress sinking with his weight. "We need the money to get you medicine," Levi says. "I'll stop after this. I promise."

"Brother, please," his sister says. A tear slips down the side of her face. "Don't go."

"Sorry," Levi says, and he gently thumbs away the tears on her face. "I'll be back soon, I promise."

"Don't go," his sister says again, but Levi leaves, gently closing the door.

xXx

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There are too many bodies. Blood drips from the walls from where the men Levi shot earlier had slammed backwards, bloody skid marks dripping slowly. There are men lying in pools of blood, face down and eyes open, throats slashed and blood seeping outward in a sticky mess. Behind him, the last attacker lies belly upward, twin slash marks across his chest from where Levi had defended himself, somehow grabbing a second knife and using both hands, a style of fighting he had never used before, but seemed to suit him quite nicely. The front of Levi's shirt is saturated, and it's only until that moment that Levi realizes he's bleeding: a shallow cut against the left side of his ribs, the only mark any one of them managed to make on him.

"You've earned it, kid," his boss says, and he tosses the satchel of coins at his feet. Even without opening it, Levi knows the coins could last them a year's worth, if they're frugal enough, and he slowly bends forward, picking it up. He turns the gold coins in his hand.

xXx

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"Sister," Levi says. He sets the medicine down on the table. "Sister, I'm home."

He listens. In the room, everything is dark, and there is a sour, sickening smell, something faintly putrid like rotting garbage. "You should have a bath," Levi says. "It'll make you feel better."

His sister is asleep. Gently Levi kneels by the bed and presses a hand to her shoulder.

"Oi," Levi says, softly. "Oi. Wake up. I got you your medicine," and when he touches her face, his eyes widen.

Her skin is gray. Mottled. Her cheek is cold and clammy to the touch.

xXx

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He uses the money to pay for her burial.

xXx

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"We have another job," his boss says, but Levi doesn't care, Levi doesn't give a shit, his boss sets down the money and Levi takes it, heart in his throat and his fingers numb.

He has forty-seven kills before he turns seventeen.

xXx

.

He's reckless and violent and even older, hardened men pale at the things Levi does. "Kid's fucking crazy," they say, and even his bosses try to temper him, faces pale and incredulous as the hits Levi takes grow increasingly hard.

"It's a suicide mission," his boss says, but Levi looks at him, dead eyes and saying nothing, not the least bit surprised when his boss tries to talk him out of it. "Look, it'll take a team of men to clean up that shit. Just wait until we get enough guys together. You're gonna get caught, otherwise."

"As if I give a shit," Levi says, and his bosses glance back at each other, hesitantly.

He's standing alone in a room surrounded by dead bodies when the military police surround him, guns out and pointed in his direction. But Levi doesn't give a shit. His eyes are dead; the blood splashed on his face isn't his. He doesn't move or make a sound when the policemen lower their guns, their eyes widened with startled gasps, shocked at the sheer number of bodies around them.

The trial, like everything else in his life, is pointless, and the sentence comes without much deliberation.

Execution by hanging, tomorrow at dawn.

xXx

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There are shackles around his both his hands and both his ankles, because Levi is the most dangerous criminal that they've had. Outside his cell, there is a faint glow of orange light that casts a soft halo in the darkness, and everything is quiet except for the sound of water dripping from old pipes. Most prisoners gnash or cry or find religion before they die, but Levi just sits there, waiting. His eyes slide upward when he hears the heavy sound of someone opening the metal door.

"So I hear you're good with knives," Commander Erwin says, and he reaches his arm inside the bars, then offers Levi his hand.


End file.
